About Martel
TV & Radio Presenter
Journalist
Novelist
Proud Redhead
A little bit more…
Martel is a television and radio presenter, journalist, author and mum. She can be seen presenting BBC1’s hugely successful Homes Under The Hammer and Martel’s passion for property has seen her build her own family home, where previously only a cattle grid lay in Perthshire fields.
Martel has presented for ITV’s Lorraine, BBC1’s The One Show and across BBC Scotland on both television and radio.
Her debut novel Scandalous drew on her experiences as a showbiz reporter and was published by Penguin.
For Lorraine, Martel has worn many hats spanning more than a decade – from interviewing celebrities on the red carpet of premieres, to visiting the sets of some of our most-watched shows to interview cast members and reviewing the papers each week.
On The One Show, she presents short films mainly based in Scotland.
She is an immersive and investigative journalist and expert interviewer who absorbs herself in every and any subject matter she is asked to cover.
Since moving back to Scotland, Martel travels the length and breadth of the UK to film for Homes Under The Hammer.
Her love of Scotland shone through co-hosting On The Road for BBC Scotland, travelling the length and breadth of the country in the Commonwealth year of 2014 for the prime-time Monday night show.
And she guest presented a special series on potatoes – yes, potatoes – for BBC Scotland’s rural show Landward.
Closer to home, Martel hosts a Saturday morning radio show for Wave FM and writes a weekly column for the Evening Telegraph.
After training to be a lawyer at Edinburgh University Martel applied for The Sun’s first graduate traineeship. She beat 3,000 hopefuls for a two-year apprenticeship which started at London’s City University at its prestigious postgraduate print school, followed by training in Sydney and around the UK.
After stints on news, features, the city desk and investigations, Martel’s love of partying was spotted and she joined the Bizarre showbiz desk. There, she broke world-exclusive stories and interviewed stars including Tom Cruise, Kylie Minogue, Sir Sean Connery and Nicole Kidman – and never learnt the art of leaving a free bar early.
Martel followed her instincts and pursued a career in television and radio, while penning her debut novel looking back at her showbiz experiences.
She is still called upon to interview world-famous celebrities for Lorraine – from Daniel Craig on the red carpet of the latest Bond premiere, to Harrison Ford upon his Star Wars return.
She is an official Dundee ambassador and proud redhead. She married the first boy she kissed (it took him 20 years to ask her out) and they have three sons. Martel has passed the ginger gene to two of her boys. Surprisingly, the youngest looks like he’ll take a tan.